WWE never cashed in on Dolph Ziggler's true potential

Dolph Ziggler was one of the most entertaining superstars to come out of WWE in a few years.

However, WWE creative completely wasted his potential by keeping him in mid card matches for too long, and when they finally did give him the chance to move into the main event, they didn't him where he needed to go.

Dolph Ziggler started his career off as a member of the Spirit Squad. If I'm honest the less I say about this the better, there's a reason that none of the other members are hanging around in WWE anymore...

Starting Off as Ziggler

I'm not quite sure why this match sticks with me the way it does, as it wasn't that great, but I always remember the 'Show Off's' first match. It was live on Raw against Batista, I know not an easy way to start out, Ziggler came into the match off the back of a few week's of promos, which led the fans to already dislike him. He came down to the ring in pair of black shorts with his initials printed on the back... in zebra print. Nice one Dolph!

The bleach blond boy toy put on a good show, however he couldn't overcome the strength of 'The Animal' and was slammed down with a Batista Bomb to provide a pleasant end for the WWE Universe.

Title Reigns

Ziggler has had a few title reigns throughout his career, however none of them have taken him to the heights that he could have reached winning his first title with WWE in 2010, defeating Kofi Kingston to become the Intercontinental Champion.

Ziggler held the title from July until January of the following year when he lost the title to Kofi Kingston, however the same night he won a fatal-4-way to be named the No.1 contender for Edge's World Heavyweight Championship (nothing to do with Ziggler's on screen relationship with Vickie Guerrero of course).

There was a massive debacle about Edge not being allowed to use his spear to beat the Show Off (the wrestling move, not the pointy weapon), which ended in Guerrero banning the move stating that if Edge used it the title would be handed to Ziggler.

Edge did use it, he was fired and the title was given to Ziggler, this was where good ol' Teddy Long stepped in, righted the wrongs and handed the title back to Edge, stating that he won the match fair and square, thus ending Ziggler's very short first major title reign.

Since then Ziggler has gone on to win the United States Championship, Money in the Bank ladder match and therefor the World title once again and most recently winning the Intercontinental title for a second time.

Failure to reach potential

Ever since Ziggler turned face the fans have been crying out for him to be competing for the major titles. Ziggler is a great wrestler and brilliant on the mic, however WWE creative seem to overlook him at every turn, seeing as even now he can't even seem to compete for a title, stuck in a storyline with Rusev.

Zigger has an ability that few other wrestlers posses and that is the ability to completely ragdoll his body. When you hit Ziggler with a move, he sells it. There are no two ways about it, you see him go down and you often don't expect him to get back up, which adds to his character. Again however this is completely overlooked by WWE.

I think that the time has come and gone to put Ziggler in a big title match, he has had a few reigns, but they were never what you would call legitimate runs, with his title matches often ending in a disqualification or something of that manner. I think that now Ziggler has been well and truly stuck to the mid card and there isn't much he is going to be able to do about it.

Contract Coming Up

Ziggler's contract is expiring soon, and some WWE fans fear that he may not be signing a new one, this I think would be tragic for the company, after already losing a big star in CM Punk not all that long ago, and not finding any talent that would be able to replace either of them effectively, I think letting Ziggler go would be an awful idea.

However as of last Monday Night, Ziggler is out of action. He suffered a legitimate injury at the hands of Rusev, with the WWE announcing that Ziggler was going to be out 'indefinatley'.

Hopefully we'll see the show off back on WWE programming soon enough, and have the great news that he has signed a contact extension, as even though I think his potential has been wasted, he is still a lot of fun to watch.

That must say something about the wrestler that Ziggler could have been?

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